


wlw ace vanya (0.07)

by wren_writes_things



Series: The Umbrella A-spectrum [1]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Ace character, Alloromantic, Asexual Character, Canon Gay Relationship, F/F, Minor Vanya Hargreeves/Leonard Peabody, The Umbrella Academy (TV) Season 2 Spoilers, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Vanya Hargreeves-centric, as in it happened in the past. i mean... future? uhhhh, asexual character asexual author, asexual vanya hargreeves, canon wlw chracter, it is happening in season 2 so technically leonard was season 1 so before, sapphic vanya hargreeves, shes wlw or sapphic in some way tho in canon, ugh idk mate idk if shes gay or bi or pan so i dont want to tag as such!!, vissy, you get it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:28:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27625423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wren_writes_things/pseuds/wren_writes_things
Summary: The one thing that Vanya doesn't actually need her memories for is knowing she loves Sissy.That, and the fact she's clearly not straight. She may have lost her general personal knowledge, but it's very clear that the only accepted way to be in this time and place is heterosexual. And she's... well, she's certainly not that. However, she's not entirely sure that she's sexually attracted to Sissy, or women at all for that matter, just to make the whole world that much more confusing. Yeah, Vanya just can't catch a break.
Relationships: Sissy Cooper & Vanya Hargreeves, Sissy Cooper/Vanya Hargreeves
Series: The Umbrella A-spectrum [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2019788
Comments: 5
Kudos: 23





	1. discoveries

**Author's Note:**

> warning: i've tried to limit the homophobia but it's still the 1960s and there's bound to be some. there aren't any slurs and i have included the least amount of bigotry possible for the subject manner, but please remember that when reading. 
> 
> not up to the ace content yet so if you want to skip ahead thats your choice :). its gonna drift more away from canon as it goes on i assume lol, cause im tryna include a relationship and ace content yk, but for now i have tried to fit it into things that could possibly have occured in canon.

She knew her name was Vanya. She knew she was a young woman in the 1960s in America. She knew she got hit by a car. She knew that when she was found, she was dressed... strangely, according to the Coopers, that her clothes did not make _sense_. To be fair, not much actually did make sense. She also knew that no one had claimed her as family or friend. Not yet, maybe not ever.

And, importantly, Vanya knew rather quickly that she felt something deep for Sissy Cooper.

She didn't realise immediately what it was, just that it was a connection, inexplicable, intense. It wasn't like she considered _love_ much of a possibility to begin with. She fully accepted gay, bi and trans people - her beliefs on many topics had definitely carried over, even if the memories of _why_ she had those beliefs had not. But she also had no idea if she was actually part of that community. It was impossible to tell what she had considered herself to be before this memory loss.

What she could tell was that not everyone shared her acceptance. And, Carl Cooper basically personified homophobia. 

•••

It was less than a week after the Coopers had taken Vanya in, and while she was very grateful, she was also already developing some distaste for Mr. Cooper. She wouldn't say she hated or disliked him , she figured it wasn't in her nature to feel like that. Whatever her nature actually was, she wasn't too sure. But Carl had returned from some bar or another with a horrible, twisted smile that wasn't from drinking or a good laugh with friends. He sat down in his chair, watching Vanya across the room with beady eyes and the scent of alcohol radiating off him that Vanya could smell even at this distance. She flicked to the next page of the newspaper, ignoring him to any extent she could without being outright rude. 

"I had a great night," he said, breaking the silence with a chuckle to himself.

Vanya begrudgingly looked up. She was still a guest in his home. "Did you?"

"I sure did. A _few_ drinks, I won't lie, but its the weekend after all." Vanya didn't feel like mentioning that it was a Sunday night. "And we saw some _gay_ man, chased him right outta the bar."

Vanya felt her heart beat a little faster. _Heard_ her heart beat. "Why'd you do that?" She asked in a hushed tone.

Carl squinted at her and for a moment she feared that he was seeing something in herself that she didn't even know quite yet. But he only smirked. "I suppose you don't even know what _gay_ means, do you? If you've forgotten everything. You didn't know who the President was, so how would you know what I'm saying, hey?"

It seemed safer to go along with this. "So what... What do you mean, by 'gay'?"

"A man who fucks men." 

"Oh. And that's... wrong?" 

"Of course it is. It's unnatural. God created men and women for a reason." He wasn't angry but he wasn't far enough off it for Vanya to feel safe.

Thankfully, Sissy swayed into the room at just the right time. "Carl. You're home." Her voice was flat. If Carl noticed it, he didn't react. He only stood up to kiss her and hold her waist, while Vanya watched the woman's sullen face leaning on his shoulder as he rambled with slurred words about something Vanya didn't think she wanted to hear. She watched until Sissy caught her gaze, and Vanya quickly looked back at the newspaper articles about missing people. But she thought long and hard about Sissy's expression. Not annoyed at her. Not affectionate to him. Just blank, just entirely numb.

Vanya wondered how much of Carl's speech she had heard.

•••

Harlan didn't speak, but that never stopped him from being curious about the world around him like any other kid. While his father didn't see that, Sissy made sure she noticed what her son was interested in, what confused him. It helped her be able to know his likes and dislikes and to explain everything, since for children and even adults, the unknown is often the most frightening thing that may or may not exist. She had told Vanya that soon after they met, in an attempt to give her sympathy, and as an offer for Vanya to ask questions. This was because Sissy had also pointed out that Vanya was quiet and shy, and Vanya thought that maybe Sissy understood her better than she understood herself. 

"-See, I think the clothes you were wearing when I hit you - sorry for that again, by the way - I think they were some type of dress-up? Or at least, not your own. And I'm not sure you remember the right sort of clothes that people tend to wear, so we need to get you something to wear cause you can't always be wearing my clothes and I really don't think Carl's are gonna look quite right on you." Sissy explained, still talking about their little field trip a clothing store while they were already on the drive there.

Vanya laughed at the joke, yet, she wondered to herself about why the idea of her wearing suits would be so wrong. 

"Sorry, I know I rant and rave, but I'm used to talking. Though I do wonder how annoying it is for Harlan at times. And now for you, too."

"It's not - it's really not. It's... nice." Vanya said quickly.

Sissy smiled and Vanya's world lit up. "Glad you appreciate it."

"I do. I really do."

There was a short silence, unsure and light, until Sissy finally pulled the car over at a small shop next to a bakery. They ended up purchasing a single set of a simple shirt and pants that she could actually feasibly do some work around their place in, which Vanya was incredibly grateful for after having to borrow Sissy's and even Harlan's clothing for the past while. She winced at the quite embarrassing memory of the Coopers realising that Harlan's clothing was the right size on her. Perhaps 'mortifying' was a better word for that feeling.

Afterwards, they sat down to have lunch at the little bakery on the corner. It was peaceful and included some laughter at their vigorous people-watching and eavesdropping that both Vanya and Sissy had as a guilty pleasure. That was, until, Harlan fixed his gaze intently on two men across the street.

Under any other circumstances, Sissy liked to talk to her kid about new things he saw and he clearly liked to know. But as soon as Sissy saw where he was looking, she only ducked her head. Vanya hesitated to sneak a glance. 

There were two men, around their early 20s, talking and leaning against a wall, smoking in the sun. Their combination of new adulthood and youth gave them a kind of confidence and boldness that definitely wasn't found in awkward teenage gatherings or older people's modesty. No; they were definitely being subtle, but it was still clear they were occasionally touching hands, laughing. Flirting. Dating. 

Harlan looked back at his mother expectantly for any explanation offered. He hadn't seen two men in a clearly-not-friendship before. But Sissy was certainly not freely or happily explaining. She had grown quiet.

"They shouldn't... shouldn't _flaunt_ it," Sissy whispered beside her. At first, Vanya tensed, feeling a rising panic that Sissy was homophobic herself. Until she saw the air of fear in Sissy's own eyes, the way her jaw was slightly clenched. She wasn't angry at the men. She was scared _for_ them. "Not out here," Sissy added more quietly, as though to only herself.

Vanya interrupted with a slight cough, jolting Sissy out of her staring trance.

"Sorry. Uh, I was just going to ask, didn't you need to buy bread for back home?" Vanya hesitated on the word 'home' for just a fraction of a second. If Sissy noticed, she made no comment.

"Oh, yeah - yes. I do." She stood up in one motion of chair scratching pavement and nearly tripping and flipping the table. She brushed the crumbs off her skirt and, without much grace to be spoken of, turned on her heel to walk back into the shop. 

Vanya just watched after her and looked back to Harlan. He seemed fine. Vanya only hoped that somehow, he hadn't heard Sissy's words. She tried to shake the too-empathetic tremble in Sissy's voice out of her own head, tried to shake the empathy she herself felt away. It would do her no good. _Not out here_ , as Sissy said. 

•••

Vanya knew two more things at the end of these events. What she felt for Sissy should only be defined as _too much_ ; and that she was certainly not straight, nor safe with Carl Cooper.

For the first time since she started knowing new things about herself, she wished that she knew less.


	2. short, sweet lives

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's unspoken, and not their own domestic sort of life, but the small instances of their own sort of 'home' exist every so often between Vanya and Sissy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning that there is food mentioned in this chapter and i know that can be a trigger for people with EDs sometimes so tread carefully and stay safe.
> 
> still not very ace i promise it's getting there and i'm trying to weave it into these early chapters a bit but its surprisingly difficult.

Vanya watched over Harlan most of the time that Sissy used to, so that she was more able to do her own activities during the day. This tended to mean that they were doing exceedingly separate things most of the time, with Vanya outdoors when Sissy was inside preparing dinner, or Vanya indoors reading books and putting on music with Harlan while Sissy was hanging out washing. 

That didn't mean their lives didn't cross over. Home, without Carl or other adults to judge them, they lived an inbetween sort of life sometimes that Vanya appreciated more than she could or should dare to say. And when she wanted to, she didn't. She didn't. So, of course, there was no way Sissy could know or feel this, in Vanya's mind at least.

•••

Days living with Sissy and Harlan and Carl turned into weeks. It often didn't feel to Vanya much like living with Carl, actually. He wasn't home during the day because of work, and sometimes came home late. Even on weekends, he usually had something on that drew him out of the house for hours at a time, and so it was mostly Vanya and Sissy and Harlan.

If Sissy minded that, she definitely didn't show it. Maybe when Carl was home late, she'd be annoyed, albeit in an anxious sort of way that made Vanya wonder if Carl was coming home at all. But there were some late nights that Sissy didn't notice Carl wasn't home until she actually went to bed. 

Those nights were Vanya's favourites.

On one occasion, Vanya had even helped make a big mince meat pie for dinner. If she'd had any cooking skills in her past, they had evidently disappeared with the rest of her memories. It didn't matter to Sissy. She taught Vanya to make dough for the pie crust and roll it out. What flour to use, what vegetables could be put into the pie mince undetected to make it a rounded meal. She cut the top of the pie pastry to read _S & V_, teasing about how proud she was that Vanya managed to essentially just not get in the way of Sissy making the whole pie herself. 

"One day, I'll be able to cook for you, though. This is like an investment in my pie-making skills." Vanya joked.

"Ah, I see, and when are you gonna do that?"

"For your birthday... which is... the 22nd of January?"

Sissy raised her eyebrows. "That's impressive." 

"Well I don't exactly have many other things I have to remember." Vanya laughed. 

They had dinner together, just her and Harlan and Sissy, and it felt like family. She didn't know if she'd ever felt family before, of course, but she could _tell_ that this was it. And, despite him taking her in just as much as Sissy and Harlan, she resented Carl Cooper coming home that night.

•••

He didn't come home every night, though. It was Friday, so Sissy expected him home late anyway, and this was one day that she had forgotten he was coming home at all. She and Vanya danced to one of the records that someone had bought a long time ago. None of them actually knew the song. It didn't matter. They just finished their dinner, wrapped up the leftovers and sat around in the living room.

After a couple hours, they had sent Harlan to bed, and it was just them waiting up for nothing in particular. Sissy tapped her foot to the music silently as she observed Vanya flicking through a newspaper once again.

"D'you think..." Sissy began, then trailed off, shaking her head.

"Think what?" Vanya asked.

"No, well i don't mean to be rude, but... do you - do you think anyone's searching for you?"

Vanya didn't have an answer for that one.

"It's not that I don't think someone's oughta be out there missing you, honey," Sissy quickly amended. "Of course someone should. It's just... It's been a lot more'n a day or even a week. D'you have any idea why? Are you sure you don't remember anything about who we could call?" 

"No. I don't remember anything."

"Yeah, of course." She replied absent-mindedly. The was a pause until she followed up with, "If - well, when, I'm sure - when someone comes to get you. Will you stay in touch?"

Vanya heard Sissy's voice waver as she spoke. For some reason, though she looked through the paper for any sign of missing persons that matched her description every single day, she had forgotten that anyone coming to collect her would mean _leaving_. She guessed it had something to do with not having any memories of a life before, but these quiet moments with Sissy and Harlan felt like everything in the world. Maybe it had to do with something more than that, too. 

She remembered she needed to make a verbal response. "Of course I will, Sissy." She said, touching the sombre woman's hand lightly. 

Sissy just looked down at their hands together, like she knew something Vanya didn't. Ironically, Vanya wondered if _Sissy_ knew what the future held beyond the remainder of this month or year. The irony was lost on Vanya, but something out there knows the secrets of the world, and right then it smiled warmly; bitterly, but also warmly.

Vanya broke the melancholy mood by suddenly leaping to her feet, still holding Sissy's hand, startling the woman. "I like this song. Dance with me."

"Dance, with you?"

"Yeah. Right here." She smiled with tentative encouragement. The words ' _not out here'_ had echoed in Vanya's mind for days after the bakery incident, but this was not a street in town, this was not a place viewed by outsiders with hate and judgement in their eyes and on their tongues. This was a home, that they shared.

Sissy stood up, gingerly, pretended it was an embarrassing dance. It didn't feel it. The music began to grow slower, and she and Vanya closer. She moved her hand onto Vanya's shoulder, arm, hip. Vanya looked up with some surprise that she suppressed as much as possible. She held her arm up for Sissy to do a turn. They didn't notice when the record finished its songs. The silence itself became a song to them, sweet and subtle, like feelings gone unexpressed. 

Too long later, with her head leaning on Sissy's shoulder from tiredness and both of them finally resting on the couch, Vanya became truly aware of the time. "Sissy, it's past midnight."

"What?" Sissy said, parting from her with a start. 

"Yeah, it's late. I know it's the weekend tomorrow, but-"

"-But we still have to be awake early. For breakfast." Sissy finished, not adding that vital piece of information, _for Carl's breakfast_.

"Yeah."

"Yeah." Sissy sighed and pushed herself off the couch. "Carl's not home."

"No, he isn't? He's probably just with friends, I'm sure he'll be here tomorrow."

"I'm not worried. Well, I mean, he can get home himself, I'm sure. I just... meant... if he's not here, I guess I'll be alone."

If Vanya were less exhausted or just wasn't so curious about what she felt for Sissy, maybe she would have said something sensical . Instead, she said, "You don't have to be."

"Huh?"

"Well... uh, I don't know, I think I could-" She racked her brain for a way to get out of what she was going to say.

"You _could_ stay in my room, just for the night. Like a sleepover... Put on some pyjamas, just to sleep in the room, and-" Sissy said hurriedly.

"I could?"

"You could."

Perhaps pleasing whatever entity or deity this universe held, with that irony earlier on, had won them its favour, granted them a night. Because Carl didn't get home until late Saturday morning. He never saw Vanya leave Sissy's bed and make coffee, never saw Sissy reach her hand into empty space and murmur _Vanya?_ , not asking for Carl but for the woman who she'd taken in.

•••

They hadn't _slept together_ , of course, they'd just... slept, together. Vanya reasoned this with herself in her mind, trying to wipe away the strange sense of guilt that came with seeing Carl that next morning. Neither of them said anything to him. He wasn't asked where he was. Sissy clearly didn't want to know, for more reasons than one.

Carl only seemed to take this as getting away with doing what he wanted. It didn't seem too out of the ordinary to get his way, (he was a cis-het white man in the 60s, after all), and he wasn't going to get into a losing argument on purpose.

Vanya thought for some time about that night. Not just from a perspective of the possible danger of Carl finding them and her stupidity, or how much she had enjoyed living with Sissy as though they didn't live with Carl too, but more, once again, from not understanding her own feelings quite entirely. She could repress it all she wanted but she felt something that wasn't platonic for Sissy and she knew her heart would break if she said anything. 

•••

When Sissy held her hands, when they sat in the barn and talked - God, she knew. She _knew_. These feelings were so much. She'd never hated anyone for their love before but suddenly Carl's talking from earlier had gotten to her, made her feel worthless. Like a problem. 

Strangely she admittedly didn't feel what she did know was sexual attraction, she'd heard these words at different points of her life, she was sure. The same way she knew what any other words and even some brand names meant when provoked. Romantic attraction, sexual attraction. These were things she must have heard some time ago. It was hard to label everything down to a tee, but while she knew she felt something that certainly wasn't platonic for Sissy, she was still indifferent about anything... that intimate.

It just made everything so much more confusing.

She had thought she only needed Sissy and Harlan and sure, presumably Carl too, when she first got here. But now she wished she had some parent or sister to talk to about all this, someone who would understand and love her. She wondered for the millionth time if she even had family out there. If they liked her. Why they had not come for her. Maybe she just couldn't be loved like other people, maybe not even Sissy could like her the way she wished Sissy did.

Maybe her loved ones were dead or missing themselves. Maybe she had wronged them in an unforgivable way. Maybe _they_ had wronged _her_ in an unforgivable way and that's why she had left. She doubted it. She certainly would do anything to get her family back right now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find me @wren-cant-happy as my tumblr main or @acejupiter as my ace blog !! feel super free to send asks about this or anything else :).

**Author's Note:**

> uhhh so yeah, id like to continue this fic, specially since its not up to the ace content exactly yet, but i will include it further on.
> 
> you can find me @wren-cant-happy as my main on tumblr, and @acejupiter as my ace blog. send asks and stuff if you like, i love interacting w asks :)
> 
> i do kinda see vanya as ace for a number of reasons, the main one being that in mine and a lot of ace-spec people's experience, being ace can make it a bit harder to tell the difference between platonic and romantic love which i personally think may have had a lot to do with the whole leonard situation, and the fact that she lowkey found the first person she met after allison told her to find someone and immediately liked him. also possibly a reason that she seems to have not realised that shes wlw (we dont know whether shes bi/pan/gay yet, im p sure) before being attracted to sissy. once again, my experiences arent universal, but a lot of ace-specs may find that sort of thing relatable as i did. 
> 
> hope you enjoyed this chapter and i mean even if it doesnt get kudos or comments im just gonna continue bc self-validation of asexuality akdjkadjelk, but i still hope you didnt mind it.


End file.
